Ep 1023 | Jase Is Carted Off by the ATF at the Airport & Get Ready for the 'Judge Jase" TV Show
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I am unashamed. What about you? Welcome back to Unashamed. I came in this morning, Zach. My brother, it's already got my little brother. He's like 56 years old, but he's my younger brother, gave me a crisp $100 bill for my birthday. Now that's pretty good.

I mean, I didn't always treat Jay as well when he was young, but I've tried to make up for it through the years. They gave Willie. Didn't they give Willie? Or did Willie give him 50? Willie gave him 50 $50 bills on the podcast way back. We called that a guilt offering. Well, I need to tell you guys something. And if you could get the message to Willie, I will be in town next week.

And it will be my birthday. Yeah. Well, that's one of the reasons I brought it up, Zach. I'm not sure you've gotten a $100 bill status. I give all my brothers, Al will attest to this, a $100 bill. Yep.

Whether I have it or not. And you know what I give Jace instead of a $100 bill, I could just save it and give it back to him, but I give him a cream cheese pie for his birthday, which is worth $100 to you, isn't it, Jace? Al has a special skill set on the cream cheese pie. And I know Jace loves it, so I make it for him. I love it. I think it's a fantastic gift. I actually got some pretty good gifts this year way back in Christmas, which was shocking. Because most of the time, what do you...

I would be difficult to buy for. Because if you need something, you get it yourself. My son gave me these moccasins, and they're waterproof. Now, I realize when I did this, I exposed it.

You know what this is? Jace came in. He took off his outerwear. Maddie and I are sitting there watching him. And he's got this look he's got today. And I was like, Jace, what is this supposed to be? Camo? What do you call what you're- Here's what happened. What happened was- Because you went duck hunting this morning. Did you wear this in the duck? Well, no wonder y'all didn't get them. You got to remember, it was very cold today. The high, the high, the high.

while we were out there was 32 degrees. Yeah. And it's still like 34 right now. The wind was blowing. So I had a pair of chest waders on. No, I didn't have any more layers on the bottoms. And look, this was a Christmas present for my wardrobe provider. It's a hole in the wall store. Used to be a seven 11, the honey hole. And all I've done is I wear their stuff cause I like their stuff. They have quite the array. Oh yeah. And, uh,

They say every time you mention us on the Unashamed podcast, people find us because I'm not giving any blurbs. And I have no affiliation other than I wear their stuff.

And they sent me. Well, and we went to church with their family. So it's like we know. It wasn't personal. I know. You didn't. You weren't doing it. I walked in there and thought I was looking for some jigs. Yeah. And I was actually looking for a hoodie the first time I went there because I was going to the airport. And I knew my layover times were real small.

And people recognize me in crowded places. And so I was like, the only way I'm going to get to my next flight is if I have a hoodie on. Because I'm not going to be rude. But, Jay, Willie thinks the same thing. Y'all are so wrong. Because when y'all look in the way you do put a hoodie on, it makes everybody look and then be suspicious and start taking pictures of you. Draws more attention. Well, I have been escorted.

You know, by security on a couple of occasions because I had a backpack and a hoodie on. And I mean, you look like you just left a liquor store robbery. It reminds me of when Phil used to tell my dad, he would tell him, Gordon, you got to look about you. You got a strange look. Which is a true statement. Gordon does have a look about him. But coming from Phil...

That was dad's thing. He was like, hold on, we're at an airport. Me and you are in an airport together, and I'm the one they're going to look at? I don't know if I've ever shared this story, but I actually, and I forgot even what I was talking about. Oh, I was talking about why I have these pants on. I guess I should finish that story. So I got dressed because I didn't want to wake up my wife, and I was so tired yesterday because I didn't get a nap, and I duck hunted.

So I just went to bed and I didn't know where my clothes were. I mean, it was one of those angry sleeps. I don't even remember going to bed. And so I was looking around. I had the first couple of layers on. And then I thought, oh, well, yeah, I'm going to wear these. I got a little Christmas package from the honey hole. Well, they gave me like three pair. They look like pajama pants, but they're warm. So I'm going to try these. But I couldn't see anything.

Which were the dark camouflage. And this is obviously, what would this be? Yuppie camouflage? Yeah, I called it urban camo. Yeah, urban camo. But I had waders on over it. Yeah. But then when I took the waders off, I went, whoa.

See, because the urban folks missed the idea of camouflage. They're wearing these camo patterns. But if you're in an urban area and you want to get camouflage, you need to look like a side of a building. Exactly. Or a car maybe or something like that. And I'll tell you this story, really funny. I wasn't going to do this to my son's friend, but might as well. I won't give his name. How about that? There you go. He hadn't duck hunted much. And my son came in from Nashville. Hey, let's go duck hunting. I was like, we don't have any ducks.

But he wanted to go. We'll spend family time. Well, we actually go. And he said, well, can I bring my buddy? I was like, well, is he an experienced duck hunter? And he went, no. I was like, well, I'll have to give him a speech. So when he showed up, he was fully chemoed, but he had a neon white hat on. I mean, you could see it glowed in the dark because you said, how do you know that? Because before daylight, when we got out there, you could see one thing, his hat.

But it had a camo pattern on it. Oh, boy. And so I thought, well, I hate to embarrass him. I gave him the gun safety speech and here's your lane and all this stuff. So I just said, make sure you stay under the roof and I'll say when to get them. And I thought that'll take care of the problem. Well, so I have my son, my son's buddy. We had Jep's son-in-law. So, I mean, this was duck boy day.

And then this was duck boy slash Zach day. Yeah. We had yuppie day. And my son's a pretty good hunter, but, and so on the end is, uh, one of my buddies, Chad, who looks like grizzly Adams. Yeah. You know, he, he's, he's a hunter and he's actually, you know, a nurse practitioner, but he's valuable to the opera. We had one bunch of ducks kind of flare and he just turned over and said, Hey buddy, we need to do something with that hat.

And, uh, well, it embarrassed him, you know? And, uh, he said, well, it's camouflage. And I laughed and said, camouflage? That thing's glow in the dark. You know, everything I was thinking, he said. Yeah. So he just took it off, you know? He took on a new role in the blind. He became your enforcer. Oh, so this- For Sergeant at Arms. This got funny.

So then all of a sudden it was foggy and now he's, he's hatless. So now he looks kind of weird because he doesn't have a hat on. And, uh, I start working the snow geese cause they were confused in the fog and I'm making a snow goose sound with my wood duck call. And they were circling us even though we couldn't see them cause they were lost. And it's snow goose season. I'm like, we kill a snow goose.

in a place where snow goose. Which is rare in our park. Is it rare? We haven't killed a snow goose in 10, 15 years. Right. And that was on a drizzly, sleety day where they were all so confused. So I'm blowing, blowing, you know, and they're talking back to me. So I started getting excited. And I was like, hey dude, get that hat back on. Get that hat back on. But,

But he didn't know what I was talking about because I was thinking it's a fluorescent white hat. At this point, it's actually helpful. Maybe they'll think you're a snow goose, but he never figured out. And I thought it was funny because Chad was laughing so hard because he knew what I was saying. I was like, find that hat. Get that hat. And wouldn't you know it, even without the hat, we get that bunch of geese in shootable range and shoot two of them. Really? Yes. Yes.

And I was like, if you would have had that hat on, this story would have been awesome. How did you know? Because when you snow goose hunt, those of you out there in our audience that goose hunt, you know, you use white towels or a lot of white things for decoys. People use diapers, all sorts of things. Oh, it was a funny story. So my airport story is one time me, Phil, a crew of us, we were on a duck hunting trip.

When they get to my bag, you know, something goes off. They look at my carry-on. They say, step over, step on the side here. Next thing you know, I have two ATF agents escorting me, one under each arm. Have I told this story? Yeah. Oh, yeah. I was in...

Washington, Oregon, California, somewhere that leans blue. Blue state. And so they looked at me and whatever they found in my bag and they said, oh yeah, we got him.

And so I go into a room and it literally was like a movie. They turned on a bright light and I'm at a table and there's about five ATF agents around me and we're waiting on the interrogator. He walks in and says, huh, Jace, what are you doing here? Only because he recognized me did this not go south.

But he said, it's all right, guys. I know this guy. And of course, I didn't know him. Right. But he just knew who I was. And he said, what we found, he pulled it out. It was a choke tube from one of my guns. Now, how it got in my bag, you know, we're all the time using different choke tubes and somehow or another, because we had none of our hunting equipment. That was all shit. But, and

And for you that don't know, you can screw in a – it's not dangerous. That's what I was supposed to say. Why would that even be dangerous? Well, because it is a firearm attachment. Yeah. And I had it in my bag. But it does nothing. It does nothing on the – It's just for looking through. I mean, you couldn't even – But they – that's weird that they recognize that as a – because all that is is a round cylinder –

Yeah, it just screws into the end of your gun to make your pattern either smaller or... And here's the key information. I never got that choke tube back. Because I said, well, hand me my choke tube and I'll be on my way. And he's like, no, no, you're not getting this choke tube. I was like, well, mail it to me. He's like, no, you're not getting this back. Don't bring anything associated with a firearm to the airport. You will never see it again.

So that was $150. That's what that cost, those choke tubes, those specialty chokes. They're expensive. And so, yeah, that was my story there. So don't put a choke tube in your bag and look like I do, or you're going to an interrogation room. Well, we were going one time with Paul and Kim Stevens somewhere, and she had an autoloader. It didn't have any bullets in it.

But, you know, it's just, it's a chamber that holds six or eight bullets that just pops right into your gun. And it had gotten left in her purse. But again, no bullets.

Just the cylinder that holds the bullets, but same story. I mean, it was here, local. Monroe PD pulls her aside, back and forth, but they let her go. They didn't take her away or anything, but they kept her auto-loaded. Well, I'll tell you this. Even though I also had another weapon in my back because they had all my stuff laid out, except the choke tube.

And my Bible was there. Your sword. And so I said, look, I mean, I got my Bible. I thought that would help because I was going to start a Jesus conversation. I didn't know what else to do. But I think that actually made it worse. Yeah, because now they're like, man, you brought a sword. Well, I think they just thought I was a radical, you know, something. You're 0 for 2 with that. I put you on a list. Well, he's 0 for 2. Remember when he had his little seatbelt altercation last year? Remember, you tried to bring the Bible into that.

I don't know what you're talking about because the money was returned and the handshake was on. But it wasn't because of your first interaction. That came later. Kind of like your deal with this guy knowing you. I think to their words, it never happened. You know, the team, based on your interaction with the seatbelt, the team in West Monroe, I just found this out this morning. They had a show idea for Jace that I thought was hilarious.

I have no idea what you're talking about. You're talking about your team? You're talking about the Tread Lively team? They said Jace needs to do a show called Judge Jace, where he rules like a Judge Judy. Like Judge Judy or Judge Janine from Fox. And he just said, I thought that'd actually be funny. Well, tell them to call me because I'm going to tell them to take you and dress up like me.

And you be me on that show. He's the one that actually gets into all the altercations, right? Exactly. And then you decide what happens to it. I might actually pay to watch that myself. It might be pretty good. All right. So, Zach, we'll see if you get that hundo. You just hold out. We'll see. That'll be a tough call. Usually it's my kids. Yep.

And if you give it to me, if you give it to me, let's do it on the podcast. Let the, let the people know. Well, you'll, you're supposedly, if all things go well, you're going to be in studio with us next week. So we'll see when we see those gold backs, then we'll talk about some gold back. Green back. I usually have a roll of my brothers. Uh, I actually gave my mom two $100 bills.

Just because her birthday is right around Christmas. Yeah. And she gives money to most of the grandkids, great grandkids. And I just thought, okay, I'm only going to give you this if you don't give me anything. Yeah. And just put that in the pile. And so-

Well, it's kind of funny how your parents, as they get older, they do kind of become childlike again because she was so excited about you giving her cash. Yeah. Like she couldn't get it herself. It is kind of funny that it's like when you give them cash. So I've started doing it as a joke, but I give her like off things. Like I'll give her $43.50. Yeah.

And just put it in a card. Because she gives it all away anyway. Right. So I thought, you know, I think it's the gift that keeps on giving. When I was in college waiting tables, Willie showed up at Bennigan's.

where I was waiting tables at. And he orders this food or whatever. I think he came by himself, which is weird. He came just to do this, which is hilarious. But he likes to eat. He likes to eat. But you know those black folders that they put the credit card in? They put the bill in it and they hand the customer the little black vinyl folder at every restaurant. So I hand him this bill.

And it was, I don't know, $12, $13. I walk back in the back and I come back and I see the folder is like,

It's like got something just wadded up in it where it wasn't closed. It looked like a Pac-Man, you know, it's opened up like it's trying to eat something. And I open it up and there is a wad of money, all $1 bills in a wad, like a ball with change inside of it, a ton of pennies. And it's just like all of this money, it was like $32, like crammed into a ball that he had...

That was the tip. So it was a great tip for a $12 meal, but it took me about an hour to unfold all the money. It reminds me of that story I read about in Shaquille O'Neal's book when he signed his first contract with the Orlando Magic out of LSU.

And it was for several million dollars. Then he had all these endorsement deals. But he was young because, you know, he had left. I think he was maybe 21 years old. And so he said it didn't seem real to me. He grew up with like an army dad. And so he was very structured and strict. And so he wasn't just some kid. I mean, he was like, man, I know I got this money. But it never felt real to him.

Because it was just numbers on a piece of paper. And so one of the first things his financial guy told him to invest in was car washes in Orlando. He said, you know, you got to get where the people are, which you now look at Shaq. He's everywhere. He owns part of a Papa John. Like he's a huge businessman. But he was this young. He figured it out. So he started going down to the car wash and he would go visit them.

Because, you know, he was just like he knew they were his and they were making money. And so what they didn't know was he was taking money every time from the manager. He'd say, you know, give me X amount of those quarters. Well, they came to him like a year or two later when they said, Shaq, we think somebody is stealing money from me in your organization because we're like two hundred fifty thousand short from what these should be making.

And he said, nah, we good. And he's like, well, no, I mean, this is a serious thing. He said, come back here. And he took him back to his bedroom. There were two huge, like 50-gallon barrels in his bedroom full of quarters. It was a quarter of a million dollars worth of quarters that Shaq had in his bedroom. And he said he liked to come in after a game or a road trip and just run his hands through those quarters. It was the only thing that made it feel real to him that he was rich.

So I was like, what a great story. And he told that about himself in his book. I need to get that brain specialist back on. Matt Shack's brain. That guy was intriguing. All right. So we're ready to study a little bit of John. Well, this John has been fascinating.

It's so good. I don't know where we left off. I think we left off at the last couple of verses. Well, we just had read the first four verses was kind of all the text that we've gotten into. But I skipped to the end because he kind of tells, like, here's what this book was all about. Yeah. And so at the end of chapter 20...

He gives this little dissertation on Jesus did many other miraculous signs. And this is 2030 in the presence of his disciples, which are not recorded in this book. But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the son, is the Christ, the Messiah, the son of God. And that by believing you may have life in his name. And then kind of he refers to himself as,

In chapter 21 and verse 24, this is the disciple who testifies to these things and who wrote them down. We know that his testimony is true. Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written. But here's what I found fascinating. So we left out there. But when I just read that in 21-24,

You see that word, you'll like this since you're a Bible nerd, Zach. You see that word where it says, this is the disciple who testifies to these things and who wrote them down. We know that his testimony is true. Well, it's the same word, even though it's translated in English, testifies or testimony. Did you know? I looked this up. Remember when I was talking about all the thread lines,

that are in the book of john we talked about light as opposed to darkness life as opposed to death love as as opposed to hate we talked about what else did we talk about the temple yep uh is a thread line well you have also this testimony or testifies which in the greek it's the word for where we get being martyred yeah and uh

So I looked this up and it is mentioned, I think it was somewhere around 70 times in the entire New Testament. And in the book of John is 30 something. It's almost half. Really? And when you throw in first, second, and third, John, you get another dozen more. So we're talking almost two thirds.

So, and you say, well, why are you bringing this up? So when he gets to John the Baptist, even here in chapter one, you start seeing that word again, testifies, testimony. But he does it in all sorts of ways. I looked them all up and it's amazing that you're basically having like a heavenly case for Jesus. Yeah. And that's why he said my testimony and I testify that this is true. So-

Just when you think it couldn't get more interesting, you have that, and it keeps coming up. You say, well, what's the Old Testament reference to this? Well, you remember when they said the only way we can have validity is on the testimony of two or three witnesses.

Well, he gives multiple and multiple ways, including Jesus himself, including him, including John the Baptist, including there's this big debate and John eight, you know, but testimony and testifying. And even when he was before pilot, it's the, this keeps coming up. So I think it's interesting when you go back to see how this is so appealing to

on convincing individuals and as a whole uniting on this one and only individual, this unique Jesus who's God, but also distinct from God. I mean, the first verse says that it was, you know, in the beginning was the word, the word was with God. The word was God. Well, those two things, which Zach and I talked about at length, but I just thought I found that fascinating. There's another, uh,

link that you see all the way through. It's like, well, judge for yourself. Now I mentioned, I mentioned this before Jase last time that John's the only book where there's examples given multiple. Some of the other ones have one or two, but there were six that I mentioned last time that actually say, I believed that,

Because of meeting him. Because of my testimony. One was John the Baptist in John 1.33. Nathaniel. Because remember, Nathaniel was like, first he was like, what good thing can come from Nazareth? I mean, how do we? And then all of a sudden, Jesus convinces him. He said, oh, wait, you are the son of God. Peter says the same thing in John 6.66. Now, he says it in the other gospels too. But then you got Martha saying,

In John 11, 24 through 27, she says the same thing. Oh, yeah, you are the resurrection of the light. She has that moment of acceptance. And then you got Thomas in John 20, the same thing. And there are a few others, too, because you could also even throw Nicodemus in there because eventually it happens for him because at the end. But it's the only gospel where you see the actual witnessing of

Of who Jesus is and then them turning to him in the moment and saying, I'm in, I'm all in. You don't see that as much in the other gospels to your point. Yeah. Well, I was just going to say, there's a big debate on who wrote the book of revelation. You know, some people think it's this same John. Others are like, just the way it's written is so bizarre because it's,

you know, picture form. Well, not only that, Jason, since you said that, I wrote this down. John 1 through 12 has some elements of the other gospels. It's three years. It's the public proclamation and the miracles. But the last half of the book is three days.

The whole thing is based right at the very end, the last few days. It's about seven, but three plus days of Jesus' end of his life is half the book of John. Mark follows a similar pattern, too. And because it came from Peter is the reason why I believe that to be true. That's right. No, I think, okay, now you've opened up a can of worms here. And I got to study this last night, but I'm not in a position to...

remember everything I study, but I will at some point when we're studying this book of John. But it looked like he makes a point of saying, even I'm just looking down here, in John 1, 35, he says, the next day, John was there again. Then 43, the next day, Jesus decided, well, I look and there's like seven days left

Because you look at 2.1, on the third day, a wedding took place. So he has these seven signs and there are seven days. And then when he gets to the end, you're right. There's a seven day period of his death, burial, and resurrection. Well-

When you think about what we've already said about the temple and you think about where he started in the beginning was the word and the word was with God. Well, you go back to the beginning. Well, how many days did you have before the work was complete? Six. Six days and then the seventh day he rested. Well, if you do the math when you get to the end of the book of John, he rests in the tomb. And then we have, uh-oh, we have an eighth day.

because look, it's now a new creation. On that next morning, right? Well, we had a creation in seven days. And what was the garden really? It was pretty much, you could make the case, and if you were doubting me, you could listen to someone like N.T. Wright, because he's gone into detail. He's like, it was set up like a temple with the creation days and the presence of God. And he does a really good study on that.

And would that include the trip into Gethsemane and the anguish and all that into that garden? Was that? Well, I told you that I studied it and I was, I was, I mean, you got me. Let me give you a couple examples of, of what you're saying that I think are very pertinent. And I may have said this on a previous podcast. I can't remember, but we talked so much. If I did repeat myself, I'm sorry, but in the garden of Eden, uh,

If you think about when they were cast out of the garden, Genesis chapter 3, God says, I'm going to basically block the tree of life. And the way that he blocks that is with the cherubim and the flaming swords. Well, if you skip ahead and you read in Exodus chapter 25, and I think in 1 Kings as well. So Exodus 25 is the instructions that God gives to build the tabernacle.

And he says, build this tabernacle so that I may dwell with my people, essentially. Like, build me a house so that I may live with my people. I want to dwell with them. And God would show up and meet with Moses in a particular part of the tabernacle, which is called the Holy of Holies.

And you could only get access into the Holy of Holies if you were a high priest and you could only get it. And this is at the temple too, because the temple later became more of a permanent structure of the tabernacle. The tabernacle, think of it as a mobile temple that they would construct and deconstruct and move around with them as they were in the Exodus through the wilderness. Well, the curtain that blocks the

Anyone from going into that place, and even if you read about the Ark of the Covenant, when it would sit in the Holy of Holies, you know what would guard that was the cherubim with the swords. And it's a picture of the Garden of Eden. So the temple, the first temple, you're right, and this is so profound to me, that the first temple structure ever known in Scripture was

was the garden. And there's another guy, Gregory Bill, who's written a bunch about this as well, along with a host of others. But that was the original temple because that's where God lived. And that's where I was going. And you had the image and all the temples had an image. We were made in the image of God. And to your point,

I'm going to bring up N.T. Wright again. When you brought up the tree of life and the cherubim on each side, well, what happened at the resurrection of the tomb? Well, there was two angels on each side. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Well, and you also have Jesus saying about the, I've come to have life. You remember there were two trees in the garden, the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Mm-hmm.

And so the verse I just read in chapter 20, which we didn't really think of it as a big deal, but in 31, when he said, I write these so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name. And we've always made that comparison. You had the tree of life. Well, then Jesus was crucified on a tree. Why?

So we'd have life. Yeah. It actually was a tree of death that became a tree of life for us. Yeah. But also. It was a cursed tree. Now this came from N.T. Wright, but I did think it was interesting. And he said, also, it seems to him that he was like, I don't know what else conclusion you could make, but.

And this is a sermon that's called, he did on John, it's called The Mission of God Through the Book of John. And I listened to it, but I only listened to it once. I have to listen to it again because he's a little bit deeper than I'll usually roll. But I did notice this because when he gets to chapter 20, he says...

Peace be with you. Verse 19. After he said this, he showed them his hands and side. The disciples were overjoyed when they saw the Lord. Again, Jesus said, Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, I am sending you. And you got to remember his prayer in John 17 and this inner action that him and the Father has. And they're passing that on to us, his disciples, and eventually the world.

And so we have the spirit of Christ because then in verse 22, and with that, he breathed on them. Well, you remember the first time God did some breathing on somebody? Well, it was the first creation. He breathed the life. Well, now he breathed into them.

and said, receive the Holy Spirit. But watch this next statement. I thought this is a fantastic point. And I know it's deep, but just think about it. If you forgive anyone his sins, they are forgiven. If you do not forgive, they are not forgiven. And he's like, there's been people debating that since time and eternity. They're like, what did he exactly mean there? But it's almost like you now have the tree of knowledge of good and evil.

because you have the spirit of Christ. You make those determinations when you share Jesus. Well, when people say, what does it mean to follow Jesus? Well, there's just a certain aspect of character, good and evil, that comes forth. I thought it was a really interesting point because basically you have this picture of what happened in the garden, and now you have this new creation, which is what Jesus accomplished through his life then.

I would even say that the idea of sacrifice for sins was present in the garden because when they sin and they were guilty and they realized they were naked, God had to kill animals to give them skins to cover themselves.

eventually, but they weren't skins that lasted. What he said was you need a more durable or suitable covering. Which, of course, Christ is. It's a foreshadowing. I think the key text here is go read Hebrews 10. He makes this whole argument in Hebrews 10. This is the argument in Hebrews 10. But if you think about Garden of Eden, this is what matters to us.

I think, man, Garden of Eden, man's kicked out, Genesis chapter 3, verse 24. What is he kicked out from? Man is kicked out from the presence of God centered in the tree of life. And he's kicked out because sin had entered the world.

And and so what happens as a result of that is there is a veil that that's what that picture of the of the cherubims with the flaming swords guarding the tree of life. It that that picture is a picture of a barrier. A veil is a barrier. A veil is a is a blockade. It's like you're not getting through this blockade and partaking of this barrier.

tree of life and being in God's presence because of your sin. And that's why they had that veil, that same veil in both the tabernacle and the temple. And I don't think it's coincidence that in the gospel of Mark and the gospel of Luke, when they record Jesus's death and their resurrection, when they record the event of the death, it says that the veil was torn. And that's what that means. It's like this, this thing's been cut wide open again. And now man has access back,

into the presence of God through the atoning blood of Jesus. It's through the blood of Jesus that we, the Hebrew writer says, like our consciences are clean and we can now approach God again. We don't do what Adam and Eve did. We don't have to go run and hide from God.

We can actually go and approach God and we can pledge a good conscience towards him. And not because we go in and say, man, look how awesome we are that now we can draw near to God because we've done these great things. It's because the resurrection, Peter says, it's by the resurrection that we can pledge a good conscience towards him.

And that only happens if God comes near to us first, which puts us right smack dab in the beginning of John chapter one. That's what it means when it says the word became flesh. God came near.

I mean, it's the basis for the whole point of the Bible. Which is interesting, Zach, because so many people are so concerned with the where. You know, where is the original Garden of Eden? Where did this happen exactly with Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane? Where, where, where? And you're like, the where is not near as important as the who.

It's God's presence that makes the difference. Well, I think they found that there's some... Oh, I know. That's what I was going to say. But even if he did... But think about this, though. Even in the garden, it was never the point to sit down there and hunker down in the garden. Yeah, exactly. Pre-sin. That's my point. What was it called? Go subdue the earth and roll over it. Have dominion over the entire earth. So the initial...

One of the, I would argue, and Michael Heiser argues this in his book, The Unseen Realm. One of the ways- I don't argue because we're not disagreeing with you. Yeah, you don't have to. We're with you. Yeah, I'm not saying you are, but I mean, he makes really a point that part of it, of being made in the image of God, he claims the most

primary part is to have dominion. So when you read in Genesis chapter one of this idea, we're in the garden, everything's perfect, but he says, go basically make the whole rest of the earth like the garden at Eden, go cultivate everything.

and spread this, be fruitful and multiply, have dominion, and go across the entire globe and do this, turn the whole world into the Garden of Eden. So you see that the point, even pre-sin, human agency had something that we were supposed to do.

And we were supposed to take dominion of the entire earth and make it God's home where he would live with us. And so that Edenic vision that God had instituted in the very creation itself, he's not done with that. That's the whole thing. You read the whole Bible, you get down to the end of Revelation, and they're like, I see a new city coming, a new Jerusalem coming. God is going to accomplish what he set out to accomplish, which is

He will have a dwelling place where he will dwell with all of the nations and it'll all be made right in the end. No, I agree. And Revelation 21 says that in verse three of 21. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, now the dwelling of God is with men, which I think is in contrast of now is it would be different if he said now the dwelling of men is with God.

Because it was coming down out of heaven. That's why there's songs, you know, there's songs we sing. I was thinking about this. This world is not my home. I'm just a passing through. My treasures are laid out somewhere beyond the blue. And I'm like, no, it's actually not the picture in the Bible. My treasures are not beyond the blue, meaning beyond the sky, as in I'm going to go to heaven. No, heaven's coming to us. I think that that's the big shift that I had to like,

start to see the beauty of God's kingdom and the beauty of what he's doing. He's bringing heaven to us. You know what I mean? We think it's somewhere way out there that we one day.

I looked up, because Zach dropped in a phrase I'd never heard before, the Edenic vision. Did you hear him when he said that, Chase? Yeah, I didn't know what he meant. Edenic vision. So I looked it up. It is a representation of the Garden of Eden, a symbolic space of perfect harmony and happiness. Now, that's an AI definition of it, so I don't know that that's exact. No, he's right. What we're going to attempt to do is you realize John –

look backwards and all the way to the beginning. That's why it starts there. Right. And he's basically, which is exactly why it goes back to pre-creation and creation. Right. And then, and he's going to say, this is a new Jesus. When it says,

Because when you look at the Greek words and all this, it makes way more sense. Because what Zach just read in verse 14, the word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. That word dwelling is tabernacle, but it's a verb form of it. Like they say, pitched a tent among us. God came down and it uses the word tabernacle. Well, you remember what tabernacle means.

In the Old Testament. That was a moving temple. It was a moving temple. And look, remember when the glory would rest on top of the tabernacle? Well, when you keep reading this, where does it say glory for the first time here in John 1? Somewhere. It says it in 14. We have seen his glory. Yeah. So when you go back and read that in the Old Testament, look it up, tabernacle, and you'd see the glory of God. Well, John is saying glory.

All that happened to lead us here. Yeah. Well, then he moves on and he starts talking about Moses for verse 16, from the fullness. And we remember that word fullness in Colossians is so prevalent there.

in Christ, all the fullness of the deity lives in bodily form and you have been given fullness. Well, that's not unlike while ago when he breathed on them and said, just as the father sent me, I'm sending you. I think that one verse, which we, it's taken us four sessions to get to it, is one of the most important in the book of John. Because now you're seeing the connection to us. I mean, you're like, well, that was his disciples. Well, that,

Has continued when Jesus went to the right hand of God. He promised John 14, 15, and 16 that he's going to pour out his spirit. He breathed it on them. He had a special relationship. But it's the same spirit that we get when we surrender to Jesus. That's right. Exactly. You've been given fullness in Christ. You literally become a new creation. And you say, well, what does that look like?

Like what we're fixed to read in the book of John, like Jesus, which is a very good thing for you to ask yourself. Which is one of the things I didn't get to ask Dr. Amen, maybe if we have him back on sometime, because he's a believer. I wanted to know, for a man that knows the brain so well, what he thinks, how he thinks, because I got my own opinions, the Bible doesn't tell us, but how does the Spirit of God interact with our spirit and brain?

He mentioned about the brain being a spiritual component, but I would love to know what he thinks about how that actually happened. I'll go ahead and tell you, and I'm not a brain surgeon, but I did have a good night's sleep. I did ask Dr. Carson that same question. But I will say this, because he brought up my dad in the movie and all that.

Well, once you give your life to Christ, your brain's obviously going to look better because. You're going to have better. Well, all the vices that, you know, his list, uh, or, you know, is almost like the old Testament Leviticus. Yeah.

You know, he didn't get to thwart him about that. No, I was going to make fun of him because he has a big, uh, one of his big things is don't act like a jerk. And he didn't say jerk. He said something like a donkey, but I won't say it. You get the idea. But I thought, well, you know what I wanted to say when I heard all that is to say, well, you know why I'm acting like a donkey? Cause I ain't had any coffee. Yeah. Yeah.

So, okay, I digress. He made a moderation point, though, which is true for any of this stuff. Just don't want to overdo it. He said the guy was like asking him, is all caffeine bad? He said, well, no, but just don't go crazy with it. So I don't know if we want to read it. I mean, there's so much I was going to say. I was going to make a point about here comes grace and truth from Jesus. He embodies God, and it says he's full of grace.

of grace and truth. You think, well, what is the importance of that? Well, he compares it in verse 17, for the law was given through Moses. Grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No one has ever seen God, but God, the one and only, this unique son, has made him known or has explained him, some versions,

But you say, well, why is he bringing up Moses? And you're literally seeing from the beginning, the garden. And even when you think about what we're going to get to, you don't think this is a new exodus?

Freeing humans from what enslaved them. It's even a new glory because you described about the glory and it would come down on Moses and Joshua in a tent. But Paul makes the point in 2 Corinthians 4 that it was temporary because he would be glowing from the glory. Literally, he looked like he had some kind of thermonuclear reaction, but it faded.

fairly quickly. And so the people then would be like, oh man, we thought there was going to be some glowing Moses. But the idea was under this system, it wasn't going to last. It couldn't last unless it was in us. And then he said, now we with unveiled faces shine with the glory. Remember, look, Moses, he went up to the cave or whatever, and this is after the golden calf, and God was going to destroy the Israel nation.

Israelite nation. Moses says, kill me instead. You can look up all these stories. And God said, okay, I'm going to let them off as a whole because you're willing to do that. But after all that happened, remember there's a weird conversation about you can't look at him or you'll die. You couldn't look at his body. Remember, he's like, no one can see me and live. Well, now he...

He becomes a body to explain him. But, oh, yeah, what happened in between? Well, God marries them, gives them a covenant called the law. That's what it was. Here, we have an arrangement. We have a covenant relationship. Do this, and everybody will be fine. What happened? It exposed our failures and our unfaithfulness to the Lord. So what?

What it really says when you read this is humans need help. And the two greatest things that you could supply for that condition is grace and truth. And here comes Jesus, and he's introducing Jesus as here is God in a human form that's going to help people, going to help this relationship, this dwelling covenant existence of God in humans.

By having a lot of grace. And just think, everybody that's ever come to Jesus, how much grace is needed? A lot. You can't even, you'll sit here and- You can't calculate. That's why you can't say- Zach, you got two minutes. Bring us home. Yeah, I mean, there's no second chances. He didn't bring a second chance. He brings way more than chances. He brings full grace. But I was thinking about-

this arrival of Christ, particularly how John says, in the beginning was the Word. The Word was with God. The Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him, nothing had been made. I thought about that verse. The first one that popped in my mind was Colossians 1.15 that says, He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by Him, all things were created in heaven and on earth, visible,

and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities. All things were created through him and for him. Genesis 1, 1, in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. So this idea is that guy is the one from Isaiah. Thus says the Lord, your Redeemer, Isaiah 44, 24, who formed you in the womb. I am the Lord who made all things as Jesus, who alone stretched out the heavens, who spread out the earth by itself.

That's the one that arrived in the form of the flesh was the God who made everything is now here in human flesh. And that to me is...

I mean, that's the basis for everything that he's going to talk about moving forward in his gospel. And it makes me think of Lamentations 3, which is not a book you quote very often, when Jeremiah said, God's mercies, his compassions, his grace are new every morning. Well, that's what I want. So you wonder how often you need it? How about every day you wake up? That's what I was going to say. You say, well, this has been deep today because we're tying the Old Testament. But what is John actually saying?

Here comes Jesus full of grace and truth, a God in a body. And he's bringing up the negative things that happened with the law, even though they weren't negative. The covenant agreement, the law was good. The people were the problem. So he's saying God doesn't give up on people. Yeah.

And so that's what he embodies. So when you start putting that in your heart and then look at all these portraits and conversations that are fixing to happen, Jesus lays something out there very profound.

And it causes chaos, confusion, conflict. But then it leads to a long conversation. But I'm going to tell you the theme of that is because it's the theme of grace. God's not giving up on people. He literally came here to save the world and not give up on you. So if you think I'm too far gone or you give up on somebody else.

Only the grace of God through Jesus is going to fix that. We sang that song Sunday, The Lord Won't Give Up on Me, which is really, really good. All right, we're out of time. Great way to end it, though. So we'll get back in to John next time on Unashamed. Thanks for listening to the Unashamed podcast. Help us out by leaving a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. And don't miss an episode by subscribing on YouTube. And be sure to click the little bell and choose all notifications to watch every episode.